Hors d'oeuvres - the latest, most interesting news

This part of our website has been prepared to extend our Railvolution news service. Its objective is to offer you snippets of the latest, most interesting news, accompanied by photos. On one hand this will let you to have a sneak preview of what the forthcoming number of Railvolution will contain. On the other, it will enable our editorial staff to provide you with information that is at their fingertips – and why waste exciting pieces of news while waiting until we have the printed version of the magazine ready for distribution? What is more, on the website pages we are in a position to publish photos for which there will be insufficient space in the printed magazine!

Please bear in mind that it is not our intention to 'digitalise' Railvolution! The printed magazine will still continue, with its full range of articles and news items. But we hope that you enjoy this new offering, and that it will stimulate your interest in our unique publication.

First Freight Uses A Pre-Arranged Path On RFC7

On 10 November 2013 six of the nine European Rail Freight Corridors (RFCs) became officially operational. On 10/11 January 2014 a freight service for the first time used a pre-arranged path on the RFC7, named Orient/East Med, which runs from Praha via Slovakia/Austria, Hungary and Romania, with one branch to Constanta and another via Bulgaria to Thessaloníki and Athína. This inaugural train ran under the licence of Slovakian operator PSŽ using the RFC7 train paths provided between Praha and Szajól, though it arrived from Germany, and ran under other operators’ licences as far as Praha. Both photos were taken on 10 January 2014. The first shows the train passing through Havlíčkův Brod, hauled by 189 153, on hire from PKP Cargo and PSŽ’s own 240.039. The other shows it in Zohor, Slovakia, headed by PSŽ's 240.039 on its own, but awaiting arrival of a a banker.